A LOVING sister has handed over a cheque for more than £3,500 to thank a hospital which saved her younger sibling’s life.

Ava Knox Reilly was just three years old when she was diagnosed with a brain tumour just weeks before Christmas in 2012.

The youngster then spent much of the festive period in Edinburgh’s Royal Hospital for Sick Children, undergoing an operation to have it removed.

Big sister Paige, along with friend Ailie Murray, 22, held a fun day and football tournament at Foresters Park in Tranent earlier in the autumn.

Ava, Paige and Ailie travelled to the hospital last week to hand over a cheque for £3,618 to Dr Ailsa McLellan, consultant on ward seven, and deputy charge nurse Kirsty McDowall.

Paige, 17, said: “It was a really nice feeling going up there and we got photographs with the ward my sister was in and the nurses who were there.”

Ava, now seven, had become unwell on her way to nursery one morning in November 2012.

Paige, of Ormiston’s Hawthorn Place, said: “It was a scary time.

“My mum was walking her to nursery one day and Ava was on her bike when she took a seizure and was rushed up to hospital.”

The youngster, who is in P4 at St Gabriel’s RC Primary School, Prestonpans, was kept in hospital for much of the festive period.

And in February 2013 she underwent an operation to have a brain tumour removed. Paige was pleased to say her little sister was doing much better now, although she still requires hospital scans every six months.

She thanked the hospital staff for their hard work and was delighted with the amount raised.

She said: “Obviously, we wanted to give something back to the hospital that my wee sister was in for a couple of months when she had a brain tumour. They did a cracking job and it was Ailie’s idea to do the fundraiser.

“Our initial target was only £500 and we smashed that within two days on the Justgiving page.

“We then put the target up to £1,000 and we smashed that as well.

“Then, the next target was £2,000 and we were not expecting to reach that at all.

“In the end, we got £3,618.”

Meanwhile, the kind-hearted teenager is also collecting selection boxes for the Edinburgh hospital.

Last year, she collected more than 250 and already a number have been donated, with a drop-off point at Dunbar Leisure Pool.

To make a donation, go to www.justgiving.com/fundraising/paige-reilly2